The Invisible, Impenetrable Todd Akin Pregnancy Protection Shield

Mon, 20 Aug 2012 15:02:00 -0700

Another bigot.

There they go again. Issue statements that are completely off the wall, and then retreat to the old standby -- "misspoke".

As misstatements go, what the six-time Republican Congressman Todd Akin of Missouri

said, was a doozy. One wonders what was he thinking. Of course, he said what he belived.

The retreat and wiggling to put a spin on it resulted from the firestorm that followed his

monumentally stupid comment, on live TV no less.

Akin, a six-term congressman running against incumbent Democrat Sen. Claire McCaskill, was asked in an interview on St. Louis television station KTVI if he would support abortions for women who have been raped. "It seems to me first of all from what I understand from doctors that's really rare,"

Akin said. "If it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down," Akin said of a rape victim's chances of becoming pregnant.

Too early to tell how the congressman would emerge from this. If he cannot survive the outrage he created, he can consider returning to his earlier, no doubt deeply held position about women and rape, and go on the speech circuit to promote it.

Hard to believe, but many women still support Republicans. Perhaps some of them will buy his spiel and try to learn the secret of how to unlock the built-in resistance against pregnancy from rape. Congressman Akin could end up rich. Think of Bristol Palin giving speeches about protecting virginity!

Todd Akin on Musafir's Musings

The Invisible, Impenetrable Todd Akin Pregnancy Protection Shield